


slow down, slow hound

by sundermount



Category: Fire Emblem: Fuukasetsugetsu | Fire Emblem: Three Houses
Genre: Gen, Implied meandering, Post Silver Snow route, Shapeshifter Dimitri
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-26
Updated: 2021-01-26
Packaged: 2021-03-12 02:55:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 12,530
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29003340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sundermount/pseuds/sundermount
Summary: After the war, a mercenary roams reunified Fódlan, accompanied by a beast.
Relationships: Dimitri Alexandre Blaiddyd & Felix Hugo Fraldarius, Past Felix Hugo Fraldarius/Sylvain Jose Gautier
Comments: 8
Kudos: 28





	slow down, slow hound

**Author's Note:**

> Huge thanks to [Elizabeth](https://archiveofourown.org/users/frackingforaffection) for the beta & encouragement!
> 
> This would not have happened if not for this [tweet](https://twitter.com/med1est/status/1303819083171979264), so a big thank you to mediest for the permission to run with the idea.

A growl sounded out in the distance, accompanied by hooves on ground and the far-away rustling of leaves.

Felix held still as he lay in wait. His breaths were even, his heartbeat a steady rhythm; as steady as his hands when he drew the bowstring back, notched arrow at the ready.

He started his lessons in archery at the age of ten, relatively late for a child of Faerghus. Too occupied with the sword, until Glenn had uncovered a surprising affinity and took it upon himself to ensure Felix would know his way around a bow.

The sound of hooves grew louder.

“Attacking enemies from a distance will always be to your advantage, as is knowledge of more than one weapon. Plus, you’re shit at magic.” It made enough sense to Felix. Even if it hadn’t, he’d held his brother’s words in the highest regard; would’ve obediently gripped the bow Glenn thrust at him, and went to the shooting gallery as told.

Felix still felt the ghost of his touch; a hand on his elbow, the other on his shoulders. “A calm head yields focus, Felix. Patience begets a clear mind, and a clear mind begets results. Or so I’m told.”

Glenn never had the head nor patience. Not like Felix had. Not like Felix still did.

The sound of running was almost thunder in Felix’s ears now, a booming percussion accompanied by the operatic symphony of the forest. Startled wing beats, the rustling of leaves, the chirp of insects.

He inhaled again as he held the bow steady. He assessed the wind in the air and shifted it incrementally, accounting for the cool lick he felt brushing against his neck.

He exhaled.

_There._

He let the bowstring loose. _Twang_. Quick as he drew another arrow, strung it, pulled the bowstring back and let it loose again.

 _Thump_. Success.

He rose from his crouch, slinging the bow over his shoulder as he dusted himself of sand; groaned as he stretched his cramping legs, making his first deliberate sound in what was surely hours.

The sun’s position in the sky signalled an early afternoon. Half a day lost to tracking the deer, then. They were improving—they made better time than their last attempt to hunt game more complicated than rabbit or pigeon.

Leaves rustled as he approached his kill, and the culprit was revealed upon his arrival: the shaggy, wagging tail of the enormous blue-eyed, black-furred dog that stood guard near it.

The tail wagged harder upon seeing him. Felix’s hand sank into his fur, at the streak of white at his neck. “Good boy.”

He whined, happy. His tail was a blur as he raised his head to the sky and howled. _Arooooo_.

  


* * *

  


Dimitri was already in bed when Felix finished washing up for the night. He was splayed across more than half the cot as he stared at Felix, his good eye half-lidded.

“Move over,” Felix said. He raised a leg to nudge Dimitri away from his own too-narrow half, and his body radiated heat against Felix's cold, socked foot. Dimitri was a furnace of a living thing; already a spare heater when clothed in fur, impossibly warmer in human form.

It made their sleeping arrangements hell in the warmer months when they were forced to share a bed for practicality’s sake. Sweating and annoyed, neither wanting to let the other sleep on the floor, wasting valuable time fighting when it always ended with Felix pressed up under Dimitri’s sweaty armpit when they slept and a pissed-off dog snoring away from him come morning.

Dimitri grunted, but moved over. Felix’s collapse was full-bodied, a white flag of surrender; his heavy _thump_ made the cot creak dangerously, his body ache made flesh and sore in a way he hadn’t been in a while. 

The tree trunk of a calf under Felix’s leg twitched. “You’re in my space now.”

Felix grunted, annoyed. He lifted his own leg with some effort and let it drop hard on Dimitri’s again. Childish, but he was much too tired to care. “I’m not moving,” he mumbled, letting his limbs grow heavier. “I was stuck in that position for half the day, waiting for you.”

“I could’ve killed that deer easily,” he said, as he successfully extricated his leg from under Felix and pulled the coverlet up over them.

Felix snorted, as he allowed himself to be moved without fight. What a novel idea, that dogs had finesse of any sort. “And ruin the meat and hide? I don’t think so.”

“I moved it just fine.”

“ _Moved_ , yes. Killing is something else entirely.”

Dimitri’s reply was dry, sarcastic under the falsely pleasant tone of his voice. “Thank goodness I have you here to help me then, don’t I?”

Felix _tsk_ ’ed, annoyed. He jabbed at Dimitri’s ribs, and his answering jolt shook the entire cot. Ridiculous that such a beast of a person could be taken down by virtue of being _ticklish_.

He was almost asleep when Dimitri asked, “Will you be heading to the market tomorrow?”

“Mmm.”

“We should attempt some sleep, then.” 

_I was_ , Felix wanted to grumble, but it came out a soft garble. Dimitri chuckled, and Felix cracked an eye lid open as he felt Dimitri shift, rising on his elbows to pinch the flame of the candle out. The orange glow burned, reflected in his fair hair, before the room went dark.

Dimitri laid back down and readjusted the coverlet. His hand settled between them, close to the dagger he always kept under his pillow.

“Goodnight, Felix.”

“‘night.”

Sleep came easy. It pulled him into its black depths with a gentle hand, as Dimitri’s steady breathing guided him downward the same way it always had.

  


* * *

  


During the Horsebow Moon of the Imperial Year 1186, Felix Fraldarius ceded the title of Duke to his cousin and vanished. Nobody knew what became of him, not his classmates from the Black Eagles who fought alongside him in the war, nor his tentative allies from the Church of Seiros—not even his closest confidant, the Margrave Gautier’s successor, Sylvain Jóse Gautier.

The Wandering Flame, the leader of the new United Kingdom of Fódlan and Felix’s teacher, would only say to anyone who’d asked: “Felix goes where he must.”

The reality of the situation was as follows.

Felix received a letter three weeks into the month of the Verdant Rain Moon, enough time after Edelgard’s defeat that news of it would have reached all in the region. _You should know the truth_ , it’d started, in a too-familiar scrawl, ink pooling in a blot where a quill had lingered too long

He’d known then, beyond the shadow of a doubt; because you couldn’t dedicate an entire bloodline to and shape an entire adolescence around someone without knowing every part of them better than yourself. Dimitri’s hesitance was clear in the slant of his written words to Felix as ink on paper, as the stain of him on Felix’s being.

The morning after the final battle, armed with nothing but the letter and his weapons, Felix left in search of him.

  


* * *

  


“Ten gold in exchange for the venison,” Felix said, irritated. 

“Nine,” the man in front of him grunted.

“Ten gold, and I’ll refresh the spell that’s keeping the meat fresh. Final offer.” Felix flipped his cape open to rest a hand on his hip, hilt of sword and dagger peeking from his side. His gaze slid to the side to eye the leafier, greener vegetables at the farmer’s cart, the ones that would cost him three gold for a basket’s worth.

He wouldn’t have cared about the quality of produce if it was just himself, but—

“Fine,” the man said, as he reached for his jangling purse and counted the coins out with some reluctance . Felix’s annoyance flared brighter; he pressed his lips into a thin line and nodded his thanks.

He could almost feel Dimitri’s cold, wet nose pressed to his side, urging him to _be nice_.

Felix hated markets. He was ill-suited to politeness the way Dimitri was not; a better fit for the job at hand if he wasn’t thought to be dead—let alone a damned dog when the sun was in the sky—but that was an entirely different matter altogether.

Felix flapped the collar of his shirt as he counted his coins. He gathered his belongings and slipped into a back alley, sitting on the ground as he undid the twine of a package wrapped in oil paper. The tip of a human ear peeked out from behind a crate, accompanied by the swish of a tail.

“Hello,” he murmured to the cat, as it crept out to investigate the smell. “Time for early dinner.”

He placed a second, heftier package next to it, the last cut of venison. The ear was still in sight; its owner was still young, and they would learn to hide better with age. Felix raised his voice as the cat began eating. “I’ve some extra meat here as well. Let your owner know about it.”

When he looked up again, the child had all but given up on hiding and was peering at him, wide-eyed. Felix pointed at the cat, then lifted his finger to his lips. He tilted his chin in the direction of the meat, then stood up to leave. He still had vegetables to buy.

  


* * *

  


Dimitri examined the hide with a critical eye. His expression chafed at Felix, and his scrutiny felt unearned and undeserved; he’d contributed nothing of value besides his obedience while Felix had to skin and butcher an entire deer byhimself.

“If you think you can do a better job, you’re welcome to it next time,” Felix snapped, unable to bear it.

Dimitri startled. “I—“ He looked at the deer hide again, palm rubbing the back of his neck, then sighed. “I cannot say anything.”

“At least you know,” Felix grumbled, staring at the hide. Clumsily skinned, laying pathetically on a plank of wood. It was not something even a child could be proud of. “I wasn’t able to do a better job,” he admitted, reluctant.

“It’s not your fault,” Dimitri said, his consolation stilted and awkward but sincere. “Each step of the process requires a dedicated tradesperson with years of apprenticeship and a certain level of skill, whereas you had to be butcher and skinner and fellmonger—“

“Dimitri,” Felix interrupted.

“Ah.”

“You’re doing it again.”

“I know,” he said haltingly. Then “Sorry,” even more awkwardly. He disliked the awkwardness. Felix could tell, because it mirrored his own.

Felix did not have knowledge of Dimitri as a person over the age of sixteen, besides their brief reacquaintance at Garreg Mach. He’d frustrated Felix immensely, and Felix had taken the coward’s path in response to it: he’d ran. Sold himself the excuse that it was for the purpose of bettering his skill, and—he knew now—because he’d wanted to see Dimitri _hurt_ , because deep down, he was hoping it would inspire any other emotion than the bland, polite acquiescence that felt like a slap in the face. Degloved palm on cheek, not even the courtesy of attempting to muffle the sting.

And he’d ran again, when he received news of his teacher’s survival. It was easier fighting for a cause he could believe in than continue aiding a losing war that rallied around a dead figurehead.

Dimitri at twenty-three was not the same as Dimitri at sixteen, but closer to the Dimitri of one through fourteen that Felix had known and held an amount of adoration for. But the fact of the matter was that Felix did not know Dimitri as an adult, was no longer privy to his innermost thoughts, and it made him unsure of how to talk to Dimitri sometimes.

Their conversations were only ever not second-guessed in the space between wakefulness and sleep. One of them not being capable of speech half the time helped, because it was easier when they were forced to rely on explicit action to get their point across. 

Dimitri smiled hesitantly and reached for his dagger. “Shall I work on fleshing this, then? At least we can distribute our failures equally.”

His hand curled around the grip, its braiding dyed the same deep blue as the leather sheath; Dimitri’s only remnant of their previous lives that was not his name or manner of speech.

Felix shook his head and extended one of his own. “A dull blade works better.” Dimitri accepted it, smiling wider, and Felix ignored the feeling that welled in him at it; buried it deep enough to feign ignorance as he sat back to watch.

  


* * *

  


Felix stomped around their camp, making as much noise as he could get away with. This one was east of Gideon, closer to the Tailtean Plains and far enough into former Blaiddyd territory it put Felix on edge.

Dimitri had never been an unremarkable person, and age only further highlighted the fact. Broad of build by nature and hale of health by Felix’s stubborn hand and meagre cooking skills, Dimitri was a stress on the shirts he’d picked up sewing again to mend, stitch by meticulous stitch. Felix had not expected such a careful hand from him. But then, there was too much he’d missed.

The him of now was a far cry from when Felix first found him, skin over muscle over bone—so emaciated Felix almost cried with it, grief only overshadowed by his own angry relief and the irrefutable, undeniable evidence that he was _there_ , and _alive_.

It made him noticeable. To anyone in particular, but especially to stray females who stumbled upon them and who were of the persuasion of looking for husbands and—understandably—found him desirable.

Felix ignored the anger and bitterness that burned in his gut, sharpening an axe with tense, controlled motions. Up, down, up, down, up, down. His ferocity bubbled, and only the axe in hand helped keep his temper in check. Perfectly serviceable weapons did not need to be victims of his rage. 

“Why did you not say yes,” he asked, and flinched at how plainly his irritation bled into his voice. “She was obviously interested in you.”

Dimitri hesitated as he helped to steady the block of wood between them, letting the uncomfortable silence build as he contemplated his answer.

Felix wiped the axe, then brought it down to test. It was not a good move, his agitation a bump in an otherwise smooth swing. It split the wood partway, and Felix exhaled a frustrated breath as he tried to work it out. He planted a boot on the wood to help, but the axe resisted his pull.

Struggling as futilely as he did would make his hands raw; he was not of a mind to care.

“I wasn’t,” Dimitri said eventually, and gestured to the block and axe with a questioning hand.

Felix stepped back, sweeping an arm in front of him. “Took you a long time to get to that.”

“The simplest answer is often the one most difficult to arrive at, I’ve found.” His booted foot held the block down as he pulled it out with no effort, shifting it from hand to hand, testing its weight.

“What’s so difficult about a _no_?” Felix snapped, his irritation even more potent. “I’m sure she would be delightful company. “

Dimitri’s veins strained as he gripped the axe tight, shifting his stance, readying a swing. “Felix,” he said, voice even. “You’re doing it again.”

The air around them went still; the dangerous, anticipatory headiness of the calm that settled into the space before storm or battle.

The unpleasant, acrid tang of words Felix knew would hurt burned at him. Saying them out would be more regrettable than letting them eat away at himself, but he’d been angry ever since he’d returned to camp to find no fire lit, no wood chopped, no dinner cooking and Dimitri engaged in conversation with a maiden and her brother who’d wandered too far from the main path.

The sound of Dimitri’s chuckle further fuelled the anger that’d already ignited at how he continued to casually engage them in conversation without a care for their possible intentions. Then Felix’d heard the words spoken in a delicate, flirtatious lilt, high and clear: these woods were terrifyingly scary, weren’t they, and would he mind if she and her brother settled for the night near them?

Felix stepped in then, not even giving Dimitri the chance to engage in further conversation. Whether or not he would acquiesce to their request—Felix did not know, and he did not leave it to chance.

“Doing what?” Felix asked, taunting. “What have I ever done, besides care for everything and make sure we have all we need?”

“You know I can’t—”

“I head down to the Goddess-damned markets to gather supplies while you gallivant about and chase hares. I talk to people I cannot even threaten because you don’t know to stay out of sight—”

“Which you choose to do of your own volition, Felix.” A low growl, a heaving chest.

“Because they would have KILLED you,” Felix roared. His shout rang into the dark, and he bit down on his tongue hard enough to draw blood. He inhaled, reeled himself back, then continued to spit his anger within the bounds of their camp. “If you’re lacking in company, feel free to wander off and meet her at night when you’re human again, with all the time you’re afforded.”

The swing of Dimitri’s axe was fast. He halved the block of wood cleanly. It split with a _crack_.

“If you’ve already tired of me,” he said, voice still impossibly controlled, “you only needed to say so, not follow me around like a guilty dog and bark as incessantly as you do.”

“For the last time—” Felix clenched his fist and locked his muscles. “I am not with you because of my Goddess-damned _guilt_.”

“Then _what_?” Dimitri growled lowly. “Tell me, Felix. Your actions and words are not congruent. You profess to want to stay with me, but you always take my actions in bad faith, and say and do such cruel things. You left for that woman’s class. You left us to _die_.”

Felix closed his eyes and inhaled, sharp. No longer the scent of an incoming storm now, just the bitter regret of words that’d festered in bile and the unaired, unaddressed point of contention between them.

“ _Fuck_.” Dimitri’s whisper was followed by the thump of axe on ground. The wind whistled in Felix’s ears, too faint to drown out the frantic throb of his heartbeat.

He breathed the way he’d been taught to calm his heart. An inhale, a held breath; an exhale, once he could hold it no more. Repeated it. Then repeated it again.

Felix reached for the axe on the ground when his heart finally slowed. He took Dimitri’s hand by the wrist, drawing it towards him; lingering as he guided Dimitri’s fingers to curl around the handle.

Dimitri’s hand trembled when Felix’s left it. He set the axe on the ground gently, then re-did the tie of his hair as he composed himself, something for his hands to do as he calmed.

Felix propped one half of the block upright. Dimitri stood, calm again, and brought the axe down. They repeated the motion with the other half, then quietly set about preparing dinner.

“That was out of line,” he said later, as they lay on his bedroll. He hoped Dimitri would take it for the apology he could not voice.

“It’s fine,” Dimitri said, a little curtly. Felix shrivelled even as he almost leapt at it, an opening for an argument as wide and threatening and gaping as Dimitri’s maw when it fell open in a roar.

“There was a chance they would recognise you,” he said. His anger was suppressed as much as he could manage; there was no doubt Dimitri heard it as it lingered.

“Protecting me was never your duty in the first place,” Dimitri replied. A simple statement of fact that made the space between Felix’s ribs feel hollow; like it had been gored out cleanly.

Glenn was birthed as the Shield, and when Glenn died, there’d been Dedue. It seemed like Dimitri’s life was insistent that there would be limited space for Felix even before he’d made up his mind to renounce whatever the surname of Fraldarius bequeathed upon him.

Dimitri continued, stubborn and insistent. “I do not want to be your responsibility, nor do I seek from you company that you feel obliged to.”

Rancid guilt churned in the pit of Felix’s stomach. His words came out hoarse. “I’ve said it before. I chose this for myself. If I wanted to leave, I would’ve done it a long time ago.” Then, “If it was possible, you deserve the company of someone not me.”

Felix knew Dimitri knew the meaning of his words; that it would’ve been Dedue beside Dimitri now, if circumstance allowed. For all his pride, he could at least admit that.

There was a pause as Felix contemplated a world where he’d survived the invasion upon Enbarr. Cheating death once was already a miracle. Two would be unthinkable.

(Yet, impossibly, Dimitri lay by his side.)

“I miss his company,” Dimitri said, his voice gentle.

Felix turned his head towards Dimitri, although he could not see a thing. It was a moonless night, and their fire had already died out.

“I think it would be nice to be able to pay respects to him, even if I lack knowledge about Duscurian mourning etiquette,” Dimitri said.

“You know why we can’t,” Felix countered. Dedue’s body had been interred on the grounds of Garreg Mach after his passing, a place of honour for the role he’d played in Edelgard’s defeat.

Dimitri sighed.

Felix paused “If you wanted,” he started awkwardly. “We could journey up to Kleiman.”

There was a pause as Dimitri contemplated it, and Felix counted every breath Dimitri took as he thought it over. One, exhale. Two, exhale. Three—

“I think that sounds nice,” he finally said, and Felix’s muscles unlocked as he relaxed.

He hadn’t realised how tense he’d been holding himself. Not for the first time, he found himself grateful for the darkness that cloaked them; if there’d been light, he would’ve been unable to escape the startling, intense blue of Dimitri’s gaze.

“Felix. I apologise for my words earlier. I am thankful you are by my side, and—your company is enough for me.”

He did not want to tell Dimitri he deserved better.

“Despite everything,” Dimitri continued, “you are much better than the life I had envisioned for myself. Especially after all that happened.”

The tangled knot of Felix’s heart pulled tight.

  


* * *

  


Felix found Dimitri in Blaiddyd all those months ago, and they’d slowly been making their way across the continent ever since.

Part of it was that there was plenty to be done after a war, and job after job slowly started falling into his lap. He drew his blade or hunted or repaired a roof in service of townsfolk who needed an extra hand and were willing to provide shelter or a blind eye in exchange. He and Dimitri mostly lived off the forest the same way they’d travelled through it, but there was something to be said about meals cooked by someone not himself and the luxury of a cot or sheltered outhouse.

The other part was because Felix had been too jumpy to stay in one place for too long. It was always better if they were constantly moving—one misstep, one person’s loose lips in the wrong company, and Felix and Dimitri could be facing down more trouble than they could handle. Felix could not let that happen.

He’d come to a realisation in the first month of their reunion that the beast he’d rued for so long posed less of a threat when made flesh. Felix could think of at least ten ways to subdue Dimitri by himself; he was sure unorganised, frightened men with only shoddy tools and fire would be more than capable of inflicting lasting harm to either of his forms. The thought terrified Felix more than he would ever admit.

Dimitri in the day was less of a cruel lethality coiled in tense muscle, trapped and bound in person under cloth under armour. He was simple for what he was, humanity stripped away and calmer for having felt the sun on its skin. No longer hidden and caged until he could not bear it, ripping through the bars of his prison in an explosion that shook and hurt every person that was close to it.

Felix watched him pad back to camp, animal carcasses bloody in his maw. He dropped his kills in front of Felix and smeared the sides of his mouth on the grass before settling by him; nudging his hand for a pet, then stretching contentedly and rolling over on his back.

In some way, Dimitri’s curse had freed him.

“Squirrel again?” Felix murmured, removing a glove to rub at the soft skin of his underbelly. He wasn’t complaining—meat was meat, but he lacked the ability to prepare it well, and Dimitri rarely understood that not all beings had teeth as sharp as his that could treat flesh in various stages of doneness as equal game.

Dimitri shifted to rest on his back more comfortably, lazily swiping a paw at the air. A blue eye blinked at Felix, slow and unconcerned. _You hunt, then_.

Felix rolled his eyes as he rose. The water he prepared would have started to boil by now.

His hand trailed up Dimitri’s underside. It lingered below his chin, scratching, before he picked the squirrels up and moved towards the fire. From behind him, Felix could hear the pathetic, pitiful whine at him to return. 

After a moment, he heard the rustle of grass as Dimitri stood and padded to his side. Felix placed the deer hide they’d miraculously managed to flesh and cure over him as he dozed, then set about preparing their dinner.

The sun was down when he was finally done. He leaned over to nudge Dimitri awake, fire-warmed fingers on his bare shoulder.

“Time for dinner, boar.”

  


* * *

  


The panic that rose in Felix the moment he’d noticed the door was ajar was only momentarily quelled by the presence itself, before it rose again. 

The lodge at the border of Kleiman and Sacred Gwynhwyvar had been remote enough, loaned out for Felix’s use after he had (with Dimitri’s help) dispatched a pair of great wolves that’d been terrorising the owner’s livestock. It would only be someone stubborn and stupid and tenacious enough to have tracked him so far.

“We need your help,” Sylvain said, upon seeing Felix’s thunderous expression. Fucking bastard. He knew Felix was incapable of turning him away when greeted with a genuine plea for help.

“Out,” Felix snarled. He cast a quick glance around; nothing was out of place, but Sylvain wouldn’t have found anything of worth even if he’d snooped. Cracked dishes, Felix’s belongings, mended clothing of similar make and size, a single cot and stool—nothing that would indicate the presence of another.

“It’s urgent,” he added, hastening to reassure Felix and save his own ass.

“You could’ve waited outside.” Felix charged through the entrance, coiled tight and tense.

“The lock was broken,” he shot back.

Felix pointed at the entrance. “Not an invitation,” he gritted out. “We can speak outside.”

“Your _prized domicile_ is too good for me, I see,” Sylvain snarked in reply. “Very nice place you have here, by the way.”

“Like I give a damn about what you think.” Felix was too aware of the time. He’d have this conversation, but not where they were—it was dangerously close to sunset, and Dimitri would be back from his commune with nature soon enough.

“ _Sweetheart_ ,” Sylvain hissed through teeth, and Felix swore. “If you wanted me gone, you could’ve just said so. No need to use my own tricks against me.”

Felix pinched the bridge of his nose. “I don’t have time for a fight.” He kicked the stool, leaving a mark on the wood. Dimitri would be quietly disappointed at him for it, punctuated with a furrowed brow and with an unhappy _you shouldn’t have done that to someone else’s possessions when they were kind enough to house you_ to taste. “I said to speak _outside_.”

“I don’t think I will, since you’re trying so hard to be rid of me.” Sylvain plastered on his pleasant-bastard expression, the one he knew wholly infuriated Felix.

He reached into the folds of his cloak, retrieving a dagger. Felix’s blood went ice-cold, gaze following it as he set it in his lap, hand splayed over deep blue and silver.

Dimitri was a fucking _fool_. “Give it back,” Felix blurted, voice unsteady. Sylvain would know how affected he was, but he didn’t doubt how it would have been part of his plan, why he’d even deigned to remove it from wherever Dimitri left it.

His voice might’ve shook, but Felix quickly composed himself; holding still as he waited for an opening. Sylvain’s relaxed posture was a farce. The moment Felix moved, his hand would immediately tighten around it, extend it beyond Felix’s reach.

Felix flexed his hand and shifted his boot an incremental bit. Sylvain’s thumb immediately settled closer to the grip.

“What did you do after leaving?” he asked, voice polite, as if they were having tea with the professor. “It was quite surprising, waking up to an empty bed and hearing that you’d left without a word to anyone.”

Felix flinched.

“Empty bed, empty room, not even a note. And now I find you, with _this_.” He turned it in his hand, whistled low and appreciative; a spark of rage shot up Felix’s spine at the sight and coiled in his muscles. Felix pressed his heels into the floor. “Very good balance. Where’d you find it, by the way? Did you rob the treasury in Fhirdiad? Rob his _tomb_? Felix, I thought you were better than this.”

“It’s not what you think.”

Glee spread on his face, a horrible malice in his eyes and the corners of his lips, which curled up to reveal an equally terrible smile. “ _Sothis_ , I never thought you would be this kind of person. Did you kiss his corpse as well? Make sweet love to your darling _Dima—_ “

Felix punched him in the face.

Sylvain _yowled_ ; the sound was loud enough to startle the birds that’d already started to settle for the evening, springing a renewed chirping and the fluttering of wings from afar.

Felix took advantage of the distraction to snatch the dagger back; tucking it safely along the line of his back, a comforting weight that slowed the panicked, rabbit-quick beat of his heart.

“I deserved that,” Sylvain managed, hand cupped over his nose.

Felix grabbed his wrist, fighting with him to pull it away from his face. “Let me see,” Felix scolded quietly, then said in a regular tone of voice, hoping it betrayed nothing, “You know they didn’t even find his body.”

“You don’t have to tell me.” He stopped fighting Felix, and let his wrist go limp. He tried to prod at his nose with his other hand. Felix slapped it away with a scowl. 

“Stop touching it.”

“I didn’t know you cared.” A wince took the place of what would’ve been a smirk.

Felix leaned forward to examine his nose, hand squeezing tight around Sylvain’s wrist. “ _Stop_. There’s a healer in the hamlet an hour’s south of here, next to the inn.”

“Not even going to grant me the pleasure of healing me yourself, I see.”

Felix dropped his wrist and straightened in search of a rag. “Would you do the same for yourself, after what you just said?” He glared at him, thrusting the scrap of what was once a shirt in his direction.

It had been a very nice shirt. Dimitri ripped through it when he fell asleep in it and forgot to wake before the sun. He tended to go without one now, when the weather permitted.

Sylvain pressed it to his nose. “Ah, Felix. Nobody knows me as well as you do.”

“You’ve already fucked me, no need to soften me up.” A snapped reply, punctuated with a roll of his eyes. He reached out to tuck the stray end of the rag under Sylvain’s nostril. “You’re forgetting about Ingrid.”

His eyes narrowed, and a brief expression washed over his face before it cleared. “Ingrid hasn’t had the pleasure of knowing me as you have.”

Another roll of his eyes, punctuated with a sigh. “Lucky her.” He looked out of the window, but nothing had changed besides the sun’s position. “Why are you here?”

Sylvain’s face went dark. “Remember Shambalah?”

“Fuck,” Felix cursed, with some feeling. “What’s happened now?”

“Did you know they’d locked something down in there? An Agarthan that escaped our notice managed to get past the protections we’d put in place. If reports are to be believed, there’s an army flying the banner of the Crest of Flames that the Church’s forces are barely keeping at bay.”

Felix paced, hands on his hips. “ _Fuck_.“

“Yeah. _Fuck_.” Sylvain tipped his head back and pressed the rag against his nose. Felix flicked him in the side of his head, then tipped it back upright, two fingers at the base of his neck.

Sylvain shivered at his touch; Felix pretended not to notice.

“And the professor’s asking for me,” Felix said. A confirmation instead of question.

“We need to leave at once, if we’re to make it to the rendezvous point the morning after tomorrow.”

Felix went numb. “I can’t.”

“Felix.” Sylvain stared at him incredulously. “What’s here that’s so important?” 

The _crack_ of a branch sounded from outside. Felix’s heart sped up; he immediately moved to put himself between Sylvain and the door, fervently hoping Dimitri had enough sense to move away from the window.

“Who’s there?” Sylvain placed the rag down, reached for the lance Felix had not noticed he’d propped against a wall.

“Wind. Or a wild dog. It’s not an issue,” Felix said, biting down on his tongue when he noted the sun’s position in the sky. “Where’s the rendezvous point?”

“East of Gronder.” Sylvain stood, making his way to the entrance. Felix bit his tongue harder.

Felix calculated the distance in his mind. “Give me the night,” he gritted, fervently hoping it would not be too late. “We can leave in the morning.”

“There’s no _time_ , Felix,” Sylvain growled, grip tightening around his lance. “We should leave soon.”

“I said to give me the night.” He stalked after Sylvain as he made his way through the entrance, lance in his hand. If Dimitri had enough sense, he would have already hid.

Sylvain circled around the lodge, starting from his left. Felix walked faster to keep pace; people like him and Dimitri who were unaware of the length of their own stride were so _annoying_. “You know how difficult tracking you down was? Two days I’ve been flying around, trying to get someone to at least talk.”

They were halfway around the lodge. Sylvain poked at the ground; Felix finally dared to take one breath. “You said east of Gronder, in two mornings. If we leave by mid-morning, we’ll reach with enough time to spare if the wind’s in our favour.”

Sylvain paused to stare at him.

“Give me one night,” Felix repeated. He steeled his voice, layering anger and hostility thick in the hopes it would disguise the desperate, pleading quality of his words.

Sylvain turned away from him and walked faster. He stopped abruptly, and his fist curled tighter around his lance.

“What are you _doing_ ,” Felix shouted, as he ran, coming upon Dimitri frozen, paw half-poised over the entrance. He looked to the sky; it was turning a deepening orange. _Fuck_.

Felix stepped in front of Sylvain, putting himself between them.

“Put away your fucking lance,” he said, low and threatening. He whistled, reminiscent of a bird’s fluttering trill; one of the signals he used when he hunted with Dimitri, the one that meant _retreat_.

He did not hear the familiar clack of nails on wood. Felix whistled again. He heard the soft steps of an animal treading light, then a warm mass pressed up against his side. Felix took an angry, shuddering breath. Of all the times Dimitri had to be stubborn—

“Felix,” Sylvain said.

“How many times do you want me to repeat myself?” Felix asked. 

Sylvain relaxed a fraction; the arm holding the lance dropped as Felix saw realisation dawn on his face. “Did you,” he asked, incredulously, “adopt a _lesser demonic beast_ as your pet?”

“Demonic beasts aren’t furred,” Felix lied through his teeth. A case could be made that Dimitri looked enough like a great wolf, albeit smaller; Felix would argue otherwise. “It’s an ugly dog that started following me two cities ago.”

Dimitri whined unhappily.

”Felix.” The lance was down. Sylvain no longer registered him as a threat. _Finally_. “That is _not_ a fucking dog.” 

Felix ignored him. It was difficult to argue when Dimitri was at his full height, almost as tall as he was as a human. “Do I get my night or not,” he asked, hand making its way into Dimitri’s scruff. He gripped his fur tight, kept his gaze fixed on Sylvain and away from the sun’s position in the sky.

“I’m sure I don’t have to tell you how fucked this is.” Sylvain lifted the back of a wrist to dab under his nose; it came away red and wet.

Dimitri shook Felix off to nudge at him. He pawed once, at the ground. Another of their signals: _go_.

“Let me _think_ ,” he growled; at Sylvain or Dimitri, he wasn’t sure. Not going would not spell a loss; but it would come at a huge cost, and it was why the professor had commanded Sylvain to search for him. But going meant having to leave Dimitri behind, and the thought made Felix—

“Think?” Sylvain said. “Not _pack_? Fuck you, Felix.” He thrust his lance into dirt with such force it stuck, then dabbed under his nose with his shoulder. He winced.

“Stop fucking _touching_ it.”

“Felix,” Sylvain said, ignoring him. His voice was desperate and impatient.

Dimitri butted at him with his head again. _Go_. He whined, low and sad, and nosed at Felix harder.

Felix felt short of breath. He looked to Sylvain as his hand curled into Dimitri, hugging him tight as he continued his low whine.

Dimitri must’ve heard the way his voice wavered. Could surely feel the tremble of his hands, the quick, frantic thump of his heart in his chest.

Felix stroked at his head, the steady motion comforting; himself or Dimitri or the both of them, who was to know. He turned back to Sylvain, ignoring the way his voice cracked. “Give me the night to think about it.”

Sylvain pressed his lips thin, hands on his hips. “Fine. Fuck, _fine_.”

Felix hugged Dimitri tighter, burying a hand in his dense fur. “Thank you, Sylvain,” he said, a gnarled sound that scraped at his throat.

“Suit yourself,” he said, sounding angry and lost, like he was desperately trying to make sense of the situation. Felix did not spare him a glance; the look on his face would be more than he could bear. “Ingrid will be there. Consider saying hello to an old friend, at least.”

Dimitri made a pleased noise as Felix scratched at his favourite spot, and his unsurety momentarily settled.

“Fine,” Felix said. “Now go.”

The sun was almost all the way down.

Sylvain went.

  


* * *

  


“You need to go,” Dimitri said, once the evening had finally completed its transition into night and they were certain Sylvain was at least a quarter hour’s walk away.

“I know,” Felix bit out. “I know,” he repeated, muffled into the cup of his hands.

“I’ll travel behind you in my other form. It’ll take me longer, but—“

“ _No_.” Punched out, so ferocious it made Dimitri shift a half-step back. “Stay. Be here when I return.”

“Felix. You can’t—“

“ _Please_.” The faint crack in his voice was a dent in beaten, battered armour. “Do not do me the disservice of thinking that deciding to go was an easy decision. Not after everything.”

He heard Dimitri exhale and the gap in his reply where he was surely weighing the chipped fragments of Felix’s calm. His reassurance was quick. “I will.”

Felix stood, moving to gather his belongings. Dimitri shuffled behind him. “Where is my—“

“Here,” Dimitri said, handing him his cloak. Felix grasped the edge of it; Dimitri did not let go. It drooped limply between them.

“I’ll return as quickly as I can,” Felix said.

“I have no doubt about that.”

Felix reached behind himself and palmed Dimitri’s dagger. He squeezed his fist tight around it, then pulled it out and held it towards Dimitri. “Sylvain took it.”

Dimitri’s eyes took on a guilty cast. “I’m sorry. I left it on the bed, as I always did, but I didn’t realise—“

“It’s not your fault.” Felix nudged Dimitri’s hand with it, then tugged his cloak towards himself. They stared at each other. Felix broke eye contact first, as he whirled around to add more of his effects to the slowly-growing pile by the table.

“Wear your thicker gloves,” Dimitri said, adding them to the pile. “The winds are colder the higher you go, and flying makes it more unforgiving.”

“Okay,” Felix said. They were a pair his father had gifted him during the war itself, hardly worn for how difficult of a task they made holding a sword become. But they were warm.

“I remember what we discussed,” Dimitri said. “I’ll take it to heart.”

_Hide. Stay out of sight and under cover. Ensure nobody sees your face._

“Good,” Felix croaked. They worked together in silence, Dimitri helping him with his effects as Felix sat with a whetstone and sharpened his blade.

Dimitri placed a hard loaf next to Felix’s pack. “Take this with you when you leave in the morning,” he said, and Felix nodded. 

  


* * *

  


“I didn’t know you were together,” Dimitri said later, as they lay in bed.

Felix went still. “You heard.”

“I hid outside. I didn’t mean to eavesdrop, but—”

“Your hearing.” Felix finished for him.

“Yes.” A guilty pause.

“We weren’t—“ Felix made a frustrated sound. “We weren’t together.” How would you describe it to the person whose supposed death spurred the entire situation— _I fucked my best friend, the person who presented the lowest stakes, because he offered and because I couldn’t stand that you were dead. And again after that, because every time his hands were on me I could forget about you, if only for a while._

“Oh,” Dimitri said. Felix felt him turn over, slide a hand under his pillow to touch his dagger. A tic he’d never managed to be rid of, a smudge on the polish of his cultivated image.

Felix never bothered to let him know, either. A spiteful decision in the past, something he held close to his chest now. Knowledge he sought comfort in; that it existed at all was irrefutable proof that the Dimitri he knew still lived. 

“What _oh_ ,” Felix demanded, then dug the sharp edge of a fingernail into the flesh of his palm. He didn’t want to leave on a fight.

Dimitri seemed to hold his breath for a moment. “I’m—”

“Don’t.” Felix turned towards him. The shadow of candlelight hid the unbearable look in his eye. He bit his tongue, soothed it with a flood of saliva. “If you don’t mean to say something, don’t say it.”

“Ah.” A pause, a drawn breath, then: “I am glad that, despite everything, you found intimate company in a dear friend. And while I am surprised—“

“ _Surprised_ ,” Felix scoffed.

Dimitri fixed him with an impatient glare that he hastily corrected, smoothed from the line in his brow. “—surprised that it was Sylvain, I do not begrudge you for it.”

Felix turned on his back to avoid his eye. It was the last thing he wanted to talk about, _especially_ to Dimitri.

His breathing remained steady, interrupted only when he’d pause to try to say something before taking it back. Felix waited. He wouldn’t push; Goddess knows it would come out snappier than he intended.

“Do you love him?” Dimitri asked, interrupting his line of thought; so softly that Felix almost missed the question.

“No.” The answer came immediately. He pressed the heels of his palms to his eyes. The prick of guilt was immediately overshadowed by the image of Dimitri when he’d found him again, and Felix stamped them out like the embers of a dying fire. “I don’t know. No.”

“You gave up so much.” He sounded so _sad_. As if he personally robbed Felix of the picture-perfect life he was surely thinking of, of Felix as Duke and happy by Sylvain’s side. As if he was responsible for what Felix became, when whatever happened was just the sum of their life’s misfortunes.

“I could’ve done fine on my own,” he continued. “I survived those five years being actively hunted by Edelgard and Cornelia, after all.”

“Don’t be a fool,” Felix said, the words coming out harsher than he’d intended. Then gentled, as much as he knew how to, “You wrote, so I came.”

He’d very nearly said, _I would’ve left anyway_. Because what was a wall when the city it’d protected was no more? Only crumbling brick, doomed to its own inevitable ruin.

“And,” Felix continued, deflecting, “how else were you going to hunt birds without me? Jump and bark at them while they shit on your head?”

“Maybe,” Dimitri murmured. The hand under his pillow slid out to settle between them, a scant distance from Felix’s own. If he twitched his fingers, they would be touching Dimitri’s.

“Don’t you dare run when I’m gone,” he whispered, and Dimitri _mmm_ ’ed in reply. “I’m serious, boar.”

Another _mmm_ , and then he said, in the same breath, “Take my dagger with you when you leave.”

“No,” Felix said immediately, delivered with the finality one ended an argument with.

“Don’t be silly, Felix,” Dimitri mumbled. “Sylvain would know something was up if you left it behind.”

Felix moved his hand a fraction; his pinky came to rest atop a chipped nail. Dimitri had different hands now, callouses carried over into human form and the backs bearing scars from the war. The only untouched parts of them were the spaces between his fingers, and the soft middle of his palms.

“Take it as assurance I will not leave. That I’ll still be here, however long I can bear without news of you.”

Felix listened to Dimitri’s breathing as it slowed and steadied, growing even in the way that told of sleep.

“Okay,” he finally murmured. Dimitri, already lost to his dreams, would not be capable of replying unless Felix woke him. 

“Be safe,” he whispered from the entrance, when it was so far into the night it had become morning. He said it so quietly that shaping it with his lips would have amounted to the same thing. His palm clenched tight around Dimitri’s dagger before he strapped it alongside his sword, so tightly the rope burned his palm.

Felix turned to leave.

  


* * *

  


It would be a gross oversimplification to say that Felix had not taken the news of Dimitri’s death easily.

He still remembered the moment with clarity, one of his few memories of the day not clouded by shock and disbelief. The professor’s solemn face; then his forehead against a wall, and his arm around his middle and a hand over his mouth. Afraid that if he opened it he’d be spewing his breakfast all over the floor.

The final death of the person Felix long regarded as _gone_ —if not in flesh but in soul—hurt more than it had any right to. It was unthinkable that he had been alive all along, and Felix only found out about it upon his death; equally unthinkable was how Gilbert had passed through to request for aid, and nobody informed him about it.

As if it would’ve changed things; he didn’t know if he would have left the Resistance to join them. Hindsight was a curse, and it did him no good to dwell on situations he could not alter—Seteth had said the same, when Felix confronted him after he’d heard.

“Why did nobody think to let me know?” he’d demanded, as disrespectfully as he dared. Seteth had the professor’s ear; he could whisper an insinuation that Felix was too volatile, too uncontrolled for the battlefield—Felix could not let that happen, even more so now.

“Good afternoon, Felix.”

“Good afternoon.” A greeting hastily tacked on, brusque in its delivery. “Why was I not informed?”

“The decision to not inform any of you was made upon careful deliberation.” Seteth crossed his hands behind his back and stared up at the statue of St. Cichol. He turned to Felix. “Would saying something have made a difference?”

Felix felt impossibly short of breath. “I wouldn’t have abandoned the Resistance to fight for him.”

Seteth’s exhale was loud, uncharacteristic of him. “It is difficult to predict what you would have decided upon at that very moment. Hindsight and distance is a blessing and a curse. You can take that from someone much older than you.”

“I suppose not,” Felix said with difficulty, his words pulled from him.

“I doubt this will be of any consolation to you, but you have my apologies.”

Felix did not stay after that, turning on his heel to make for the training grounds. His throat was dry; his tongue swelled in his mouth, so parched a trough of water would not quench his thirst or his rage, his unsettledness or his fury. He imbued every swing of his blade with his desperation and grief and lament; decorated his weapon with sweat instead of the tears he could not shed.

The weeks after that were filled with training, sleep and mealtimes packed so closely together he barely had time to breathe and even less to linger on uninvited thoughts. So when Sylvain had presented an easy solution, he’d said _yes_ ; desperate for any way to forget. When he touched Felix, they were the only times he ceased to be dry underbrush just waiting to be ignited by a spark; begging to be unleashed and let loose until it was over and he had to collect the pieces of himself again.

With Sylvain, he had simply… _existed_ , for the moment.

But it was of no matter. Things were different now. For someone who lamented that thinking about the past was no use, Felix lingered on it too often for his liking.

He shook his head, then raised his fist to knock.

His first rap on Sylvain’s door was demanding; what Dimitri would describe in favourable terms as _a tad shy of polite_. When it failed to elicit a response, he thumped harder and yelled, “SYLVAIN!”

Sylvain was a heavy sleeper. His ghosts from the war affected him in an entirely different way from Felix, who would startle awake at the drop of a glove. Felix had to slap him awake from a nightmare once, straddled over his thrashing body and using his full strength to pin him down. It scared him more than he wanted to admit; exacerbated the intensity of his loathing for the war that had taken so much from them.

“You’re early,” Sylvain said dumbly, his hair sleep-tousled.

“You said we needed to make haste. So make haste.” Felix ducked under his arm, nudging the door wider with the jut of his shoulder. He looked pointedly to Sylvain’s unpacked belongings, then him.

“Never change, Felix,” Sylvain bitched, as he gathered his things. Felix twitched, annoyed. If he didn’t know Sylvain wouldn’t take the issue of time in vain, he’d have thought he was moving slower to get a reaction out of Felix. Even the way he packed was grating; he had to fold each article of clothing a certain way, his fastidiousness similar to Dimitri’s in spirit if more accomplished in execution.

Felix turned his back to Sylvain as he dressed. A brief tap on his shoulder, and he was following Sylvain out of the inn, then out of the hamlet. They were silent for the half-hour walk, Sylvain leading them to a patch of flat, sandy ground as the sky began to lighten.

Sylvain looked up to the sky and whistled, high and piercing. He turned to Felix and said, “She won’t be long.”

A singular, sharp nod of acknowledgement. Neither of them said anything, and Felix hoped it would remain that way for as long as Sylvain could stand. He scuffed his boot on the ground; it dislodged a few grains of sand, and Felix watched them roll along, buffeted by an invisible breeze.

“So.”

Not that long, then.

“Care to catch me up on whatever happened?” A pause; Sylvain’s _tell me to shut up if you don’t want to_ implicit in the breath he drew. “I know I wasn’t all that bad.”

“It wasn’t you,” Felix said.

“What a relief.” The quirk of his lips was dissatisfied, his own anger visibly bit back. “That’s the first time I’ve had that used on me. I really deserved all those slaps, in hindsight.”

A black speck was clear in the sky, growing larger. Felix reached into his pack for the gloves Dimitri had carefully packed at the very top.

“I had my reasons.” He pulled his daily ones off and placed them inside, careful to direct his gaze away from Sylvain.

The air around them stirred. Felix looked up, and the black speck was much bigger; he was able to make out the shape of Sylvain’s wyvern as she circled further down.

“For what it’s worth,” Felix said. “I’m sorry.”

Sylvain’s laugh was an incredulous choke. Felix tried his best to pay it no mind. “I asked for an explanation and got an apology instead. From _Felix Fraldarius_ , no less.”

Felix looked up at him. The gusts of wind blew harder, and a loose strand of hair whipped into his face. Sylvain raised his hand, a half-aborted move to ease it away from where it’d caught in Felix’s mouth; they froze, and Sylvain pointed to it instead, mimed tucking it behind an ear.

He tucked it behind his ear, keeping his hand there as the winds stirred even harder. He looked down at the grains of sand, blown further away and away.

“Maybe one day,” he said.

“You don’t have to tell me if you don’t want to,” Sylvain replied. “But I’ll accept your apology.”

His wyvern landed with a _thump_. Sylvain went up to her, murmuring a greeting; petting her on her snout, stroking it. Felix stepped up to her as Sylvain strapped her saddle and bridle on, offering a hand. She sniffed it, reared back and paused, then pressed her nose deeper into his palm; snorting as she glared at him, then Sylvain in turn.

“She hates the smell of your dog.” Sylvain supplied.

“I know,” Felix scowled. He looked her in the eye. “I’m terribly afraid I’ll have to impose his stink on you. He’s difficult to bathe.”

The gloves were adept at muffling sensation, perfect for riding pillion. He barely felt anything through them; not the cold bite of wind that stung his face as they took to the air, not the curve of waist below his hand he’d once known as well as the grip of his sword.

They were not so far up and going so fast that it was worrying yet. Felix had faith in Sylvain—enough to trust him with his back on the battlefield, and at least enough to fly with him. He looked down, watched as they passed the hamlet and the sparse thicket of trees; then farm animals, then land. The lodge came into view soon enough, a run-down thing that was unexpectedly sturdy on its legs for how shabby it looked.

They climbed higher, and it shrunk in size even as they approached it. A round, black speck appeared from behind it, running fast as it chased them. Felix could feel the wyvern’s muscles work harder beneath his seat, where his thighs were pressed up against her body; his neck ached as he craned it back, watched the black speck run and run before it slowed, stopped.

Dimitri chased all sorts of flying things. His sight was not good, and he would barely be able to make out the scent of Felix on the wind. 

Felix turned back to the front and stared at the back of Sylvain’s head. A low, mournful howl sounded in the distance. He squeezed his eyes shut against the sting of wind, and told himself the feeling that curled in his gut was because of Sylvain and Sylvain alone.

  


* * *

  


The taste of pre-battle preparation had felt like a homecoming: the smell of sweat and weapon oil in the air, the sound of shouting and metal parts clinking from armour being put on and weapons readied by their wielders. All working in tandem to call forth the sense memory of a war so recently ended it was still difficult to wake sometimes and not reach for the sword propped beside him; shaking hand and quickened heart quelled only by the weight of Dimitri so close by; breaths Felix matched to the arrhythmic thump of Dimitri’s heartbeat strong under his palm, or—if it was already bright out—through fur and bone and muscle.

Felix had pushed all thoughts of Dimitri aside as much as he could bear, because the situation at hand demanded his focus. 

Charge. Kick. Dodge, twirl, the slash of a sword. It’d been a while since Felix had a worthy opponent, and his heart pounded with excitement as he faced up against Fraldarius. She swooped down at him, and he almost raised his left arm—a reflex so ingrained, he’d forgotten that the shield that was twin to hers was locked deep below Garreg Mach, propped next to Areadbhar and looked over by its ruler.

  


* * *

  


Felix had his hood up to avoid scrutiny. It was too warm to be doing so, but he had more than enough time to grow used to the heat; Dimitri’s recently-developed reluctance to leave his side when he slumbered would be unbearable as they moved into summer.

The best were strengthened by extreme conditions; Felix’s just came in unlikely shapes.

Ingrid was visible from a distance, clad in the armour that marked her as ruler of Galatea. Her hair was cropped shorter than before; Felix suspected it’d have been even more so if not for the ribbons still woven into it.

Her expression softened as she approached Felix. Ingrid moved differently now, fluid in polished steel that seemed more a part of her than her donned uniform. He saw a hint of it in the war; it’d become fully realised in the time that’d since passed. “It’s good to see you again.”

“You’ve grown,” was his reply. She smiled, then stood straighter.

“So have you,” she said. “You’re a lot—“ she paused. “A lot calmer from how you were.”

Frenetic. Reckless. Never to a point that would endanger his position in the professor’s primary team, but enough that it earned him more than a few concerned looks.

They heard someone call her name and turned back to see her battalion waiting, similarly armoured and accompanied by their pegasi. Ingrid smiled at the rider at the head of the group; she smiled back, and Ingrid’s own grew to one he’d not seen since their childhood, when Glenn was still alive.

“I’ll catch you later, if you’re still around,” Ingrid said.

“I won’t be,” Felix replied.

“We’ll see.” She reached up to punch him in the shoulder before turning to leave, and Felix allowed himself a smile before making his way towards camp. He couldn’t fly a wyvern, but there was a chance he could request to borrow a horse—

An arm slung itself around Felix’s shoulders, accompanied by a familiar, rough chuckle that sent a shiver up his spine. The stink of sweat and metal was almost overpowering, but Felix did not shrug Sylvain off.

“She’s different now, isn’t she,” Sylvain said, cheery. His smile in all its genuinity was infectious, and Felix responded to it involuntarily, mouth lifting higher at the corners. Sylvain beamed wider at it.

Felix nodded. “She seems to be.”

“Look,” he said, and the smile slid off Felix’s face at the shift in his tone. “I know you’re keen to get back to your shack—”

“I can’t,” Felix interrupted.

The hold around Felix’s shoulders tightened, like Sylvain was afraid Felix would run. “Listen to me. Rest for the night, and I’ll take you back on my wyvern, or Ingrid on her pegasus. Your choice of companion and flying creature.” 

A ready counter. He came prepared.

Felix thought about Dimitri alone. Jaws clamped tight over the meat of his heart, teeth bleeding muscle. “I have a dog to feed.”

“If you travel by foot, it’ll be two weeks at most. It’ll be five days by horse, and one by air if we fly without rest.”

“Your wyvern won’t be happy about it.” Whatever clamped around his heart slowly relaxed its jaw, and the anxious feeling lessened. The urge to make haste and set off on foot at once still nagged, even if Felix knew better.

“Had to give you options,” Sylvain said, and Felix harrumphed. “That’s not a no,” he responded in turn, almost crowing.

“Of course it’s not a no. I didn’t say no, did I?”

“You just did.” He lifted two fingers up, and Felix swatted at it like he would a bug. “Twice.”

Sylvain dropped his hand. “A bit of banter, Felix. You know I’m joking.”

“I don’t.” Felix rolled his eyes.

“Ah,” Sylvain sighed exaggeratedly. “Just like the good old days.”

He looked down at Felix and raised an eyebrow. His hand, slowly but surely, slid down Felix’s arm.

Felix remembered a body bent over his, crowding him up against a wall. A mouth, biting bruises along the inner skin of his thighs as Felix’s hands curled in hair and _pulled_. The same mouth on him, hot and wet and sucking, tongue against the tip as Felix’s legs trembled to keep him upright.

His want to be touched prickled at him, impatient under his skin; seeing Sylvain more than served as a reminder of a hand not his own on himself. 

But Sylvain’s handsalso served as a reminder of a time he would rather not recall, instead leaving it locked and buried in a chest under soil.

 _No_. He shook his head, a slight move that articulated his answer clearly enough.

Sylvain sighed. His shoulders and brows rose with his inhale, before they landed. _Your loss_ , his eyes said, but they glittered with a certain mirth.

His hand retreated back to safer territory, remaining on Felix’s shoulder as he chattered on about the new thoroughbred he recently acquired.

  


* * *

  


“Thank you for the ride.” Felix crossed his arms, looking up at Sylvain. He was sat atop his wyvern; a situation he had to attend to at Garreg Mach immediately, or so Felix gathered.

“It’s no problem. I make stopovers at secluded towns bordering Kleiman all the time.”

Felix barely stopped the roll of his eyes. Sylvain and his wyvern flew as fast as they did to have him back before nightfall; the least he could do was not reward them with rudeness. Dimitri would be impressed with his restraint. “Bye,” he said instead.

“No ‘I’ll be seeing you again’, or anything of that sort?” Sylvain asked.

Felix pretended to adjust his pack. “I don’t know,” he said quietly, then looked up at Sylvain. His eyes held a tinge of sadness, and a small bit of it echoed in Felix’s heart. “Don’t come looking for me here in the future. It’s only temporary.”

“Where should I go, then? Follow rumours of a wandering mercenary and his dog?” His voice was thick with sarcasm.

“You found me well enough this time,” Felix said.

“Dumb luck and a keen sense for little Fraldariuses I had to rescue from the woods back in the day,” Sylvain sighed, rolling his shoulders back. 

“We don’t spend a lot of time in one place,” Felix admitted. “We just go wherever we need to be.”

“I see,” Sylvain murmured. They paused. The air took on the strange quality when one was not sure if they should leave, and say another goodbye as they did.

“I’ll write to you,” Felix said, as Sylvain picked up the reins. “Do you remember the shorthand we used in the war?”

He stared at Felix, who turned away from him to look at the blazing orange of sunset that coloured the sky. “You know the way my memory works,” he said, and Felix dreaded what he would say next. “I don’t forget. I’ll be seeing you.”

Felix’s gaze remained fixed on the ground as he heard the beat of wings that signalled Sylvain’s departure. He stood for a moment, then hastened forward. There was no time for him to dwell on the matter of what lay between Sylvain and him; not worth the effort, because there was no more to it after this.

His footsteps were brisk and sure as he walked. He gripped Dimitri’s dagger tightly, said a quick prayer to a god he only spoke the name of in frustration or at his most desperate.

The telltale glow of a lit window keeping vigil shone in the distance, waiting for him. Beckoning him.

He slowed, keeping an even pace. Dimitri’s silhouette was visible from a distance, his head tilted up at the sky.

“Boar,” Felix called. It was said at a normal volume, but the night was so silent it travelled. He walked on steady legs, his footsteps sure, as Dimitri did the same.

Dimitri received the dagger Felix held out to him with a grateful smile. His hand brushed Felix’s, and Felix almost pressed his closer. Felix’s hands were not cold—they’d been gloved on the flight over—but Felix always gravitated towards the warmth, and Dimitri was a hearth.

“How is Ingrid?” Dimitri asked. “Sylvain?”

“Ingrid is more than fine.” Felix paused, trapping his words in his mouth, rolling them around. He chose them carefully, shaped the sentence in his mind before he put sound to it. Dimitri would not be given anything that would reinforce the nonexistent relationship that he’d surely built up in his head. “Sylvain is not dead.”

“Yourself?” Dimitri asked.

“I’m here, aren’t I?” Felix said, looking up at him. 

Dimitri smiled, relieved, and Felix rocked back on his heels.

“And their lands?” Dimitri pressed, hesitant.

“As well as they can manage,” Felix said. “Border troubles with Sreng, as it always is. The most recent agreement ran into some trouble. Ingrid has been arguing for the preservation of Galatea’s borders, and her role in the war has given her a stronger voice in court.”

Dimitri looked skyward, his jaw working as he berated himself.

“It’s not your fault,” he said. Maybe his and Sylvain’s and Ingrid’s, for not having stayed with Dimitri; but that was a reality they would never know.

“I know,” Dimitri said. He swallowed; Felix watched the bump in his throat move up, then down.

He pointed up. Dimitri always used his thumb, with the rest of his fingers curled in to resemble a fist. “I was looking to the sky while waiting for you. Every night you were gone, I came out to sit with the stars for a while before I went to bed.”

Felix looked up at the clear sky, stars shining from the dark. The brightest lay at the peak of all the others, pointing the way north.

“The King’s Right Hand,” he murmured.

Dimitri hummed an affirmation. He’d always been better at stargazing than Felix; was taught to look to the sky by his tutors, when Felix’s own studies had remained rooted in earth and water and the occasional herbaceous plant. “Named by Loog, for Kyphon.”

“I know the story,” Felix reminded him. It was given a passing mention in every revised version of Faerghus history that existed; not one child of the former Holy Kingdom did not know of it.

“Naturally. We received a similar basic education, after all,” Dimitri snarked back, his playfulness almost concealing the underlying sadness Felix easily picked up on; he heard it in the empty space that lingered after his words, read in the hunch of his back.

“Do you miss Fraldarius, Felix?” Dimitri asked, as Felix focused on eight points of the constellation; five for each finger, three for the base of a palm. It was a question he would be more capable of answering in ten years, if he’d deciphered his feelings by then.

He let his words sit with him for a while. “I miss my memory of it,” he finally said, then tilted his head to the side to look at Dimitri.

He stared back at Felix, wistful and longing, before turning away; his chin tilted up and his gaze fixed on the sky, the perfect image of a tragedy-struck prince in exile.

“That could’ve been you, if I hadn’t failed,” Dimitri said. “I’m sorry I couldn’t make you a star.”

 _This must be how a broken vase feels_ , Felix thought. He crossed his arms, and clutched tight at his own elbows in parody of self-comfort. He felt too much at once; both shattered pottery and the gentle, delicate dance that required a steadier hand and held breath to piece it back together.

“I never wanted to be a star,” Felix said. “I wanted—.” _You to be alive_? _The Dimitri that I knew_?

The sentence trailed off as the words remained stuck in his throat.

Dimitri looked to the sky again, a purposeful redirection of his gaze to give Felix privacy. It was relieving and upsetting, how attuned to Felix’s moods he had grown into again.

“It is not that bad, right?” he said. “Being on the road. Travelling in service of the people.”

“No,” Felix admitted. His mouth hung open on a half-thought, then closed it. “You really do not mind being a vagabond, do you. Wandering the world and living life as companion to a mercenary.” More statement than question.

Dimitri’s mouth opened in a pleased grin as he sucked in a breath. Felix looked at the points of his teeth, sharper than a human’s had any right to be. “Definitely not.”

“How long can we be like this?” Man and beast, traversing the continent and tiptoeing along the edges of where humanity thrived.

“As long as we want to,” Dimitri replied.

“You’re getting away with yourself.” Felix felt the corner of a lip turn up. “We’re already running out of ways to disguise you in daylight—what are we to do next? Dye your fur? Throw a blanket over you and call you my overgrown pony?”

Dimitri laughed then, a sound so free and light it gave Felix pause; a sound not heard in so long he’d almost forgotten Dimitri was capable of it. Felix’s heart sped up, and for the first time in a long while, it felt light. Unweighted.

“You would be surprised,” Dimitri said. “People tend to see only the things they want to.”

Felix scoffed, then reached out to brush a thumb over the shadowed dark under Dimitri’s good eye. It seemed like he’d slept as badly as Felix did when they were apart. “What I am _seeing_ ,” he said, with particular emphasis, “is someone who neglects sleep in favour of looking at the night sky.”

“I was waiting for you,” he replied, a hint of petulance in his voice. Felix rolled his eyes again, ignoring the gladdened trill of his heart.

He lifted his leg to kick the back of Dimitri’s shin. There was no force in it; it came out more like a tap, and Dimitri’s indulgent smile said it was no harder than an infant’s feeble punch. 

“I’m here now,” he said, as they walked back to the lodge. Felix passed through the entrance with no problem; Dimitri, who was so overgrown he looked comically large in indoor spaces, ducked. Together, they prepared for bed; unlike the previous nights, Felix had no trouble falling asleep at all.

  


* * *

  


“Do you really not want to reclaim Blaiddyd for yourself?” Felix asked once, staring out at the edge of the sea as it warmed purple. He hadn’t realised how long they’d been there for.

Dimitri slouched slightly.

“Don’t you?” Felix extended his foot and tapped his boot against Dimitri’s. He looked out to the water; Felix watched him as he gathered his thoughts, temples dimpling and the spot between his brows creasing.

“Is it worth it,” he asked, “considering the lives already lost? Your father—” And Felix felt a pang of sadness shoot through him, spearing him so thoroughly he almost choked, doubled over with it. “—and Gustave. Dedue. So many lives upended and lost for a kingdom I could not retake.”

His voice trembled. “I remember them bleeding, Felix. Dying. Their bodies in my arms, breaths leaving—“

“ _Stop_ ,” Felix gasped. He had an inkling of it, but to hear Dimitri speak of it so frankly was a different matter. 

What mattered was that Dimitri was there. Whole. _Alive_. 

“I’m s—“

“Don’t.”

Light broke the edge of the sea then, a brightness introducing itself, gentle despite how it blinded.

Felix startled at it. It felt impossibly like what looking at the Goddess would be like, if she was real at all.

“You called me a bloodthirsty beast once.” Dimitri said.

The sun climbed higher; small, incremental steps, rising into the sky with grace. It reminded Felix of the perfect arc of Dimitri’s arm when he readied a lance to throw, and in his other form, perfectly, gracefully sprung from atop a cliff. The first time Felix saw him in motion, his breath had stopped in his lungs, and the moment had felt almost frozen in time.

“I did,” Felix replied.

“I want no more part of taking human lives. And—” he hesitated. “I do not think I can return to living my old one without spilling more blood. I will not lose you as well, my friend.”

A feeling spread outward from his breastbone. Felix heard the sounds of disrobing behind him, as warmth that was carried on the sunlight gently kissed his skin. A moment’s pause, and then a warmer, furred body pressed up against the side of his leg. 

Felix’s hand found its way behind Dimitri’s ears.

“You won’t,” he promised, and they sat and watched as the sun painted the earth in daylight.

**Author's Note:**

> Even after the war's end, skirmishes continued to break out across Fódlan. Little is known of Felix’s whereabouts after the culminating battle, but even many years later, soldiers involved in the skirmishes continued to whisper rumors of a mysterious man accompanied by a beast, able to deal swift death to scores of enemies.


End file.
